The Battle is Not Yet Won

So to start off, Congratulations New Yorkers, your state made history.... a few times, with one legislative act.  First, the one and only republican controlled legislature to pass a gay marriage amendment. What an achievement.  Second, a campaign financed by former republican operatives helped make it possible. Who'd have thought that would ever happen?  Finally, doubling the number of eligible gay population who are in states where they can legally get married. YEAH for us........

These things give me great happiness and provide me with hope that we are crossing the line in the fight to be recognized for who we are, that we are not second class citizens and that our love is just as 'real' as some one who is straight.  But it also gives me a daunting perspective; The fear that I won't be around to see the end of the fight; The sadness to know that there might be a gay child born today, who still 20 years from now will be barred from marring the person they love.  

It is with dubious cheer that I celebrate gay pride month with my brothers and sisters from across the country.   Congratulations to us for a battle hard fought and won.  Strength be with us as we soldier on.  Our fight is not yet done; We cannot sit back and wait for the fight to be brought to us.  Even as New Yorkers celebrate their victory over hate and fear, Minnesota prepares to once again let people vote on civil rights.  North Carolina republicans are exploring putting our rights to a vote as early as 2012.  One has to question the timing of this.... coinciding with a presidential election year where republican have vowed to do nothing less then everything they possibly can to keep the President Obama from being reelected (but that is a different topic for a different day)

We have a duty as Americans, to not let discrimination stand in any way of equal treatment under the law.  It is un-American to stand aside and let people's rights be taken away because it doesn't directly impact you.  America is the land of the free.  It is not the land of the free with an asterisk to exclude certain groups.  

To show the republicans that we will not be stopped.  To show people like Maggie Gallagher and Brian Brown of NOM that their chicken-shit attempts to suppress our freedoms will not keep us from winning in the end.  To take it to the Karl Roves of the world and show them that elections cannot be bought with a super PAC.  To let the supreme court know that we will not stand for corruption and subversion of the judicial process by letting corporations control our government.  We must fight as we have never fought before and do what we have failed to do in 31 states so far.  WIN.